Adel Irhayyim - Applied Linguistic

1. Tarbiat Modares University
Faculty of Humanities
Department of English Language Teaching
Course: Applied Linguistics in Teaching Languages
Instructor: Dr. Tajeddin
Presenter: Adil Irahyyim
RICHARD JOHNSTONE
Language Teacher Education

2. Introduction
Social, Political, and Cultural Background
Aspects of Provison
Ideology and Process
From Novice to Expert
LTE and Applied Lingustics Research
Summary:

3. Introduction
 What is Language Teacher Education (LTE) ?
Is concerned with the professional development of language
teachers. It is concerned with the social, political, and cultural
factors that affect the teaching of specific languages. Its coverage
includes methodologies, curriculum development, syllabus design,
material development, and evaluation and testing.

4.  The situation in teacher training reflects the historical development of an education
system, of a socioeconomic system and of the political character of a country.
 In Spain a policy of decentralization since the mid-1980s had led to the rise of
autonomous regions and the establishment of teachers’ centers as the main location for
continuing education courses.
 In Portugal, the rights of teachers to continuing education within normal working hours
had been established by law, along with the right to apply for sabbatical leave in order to
take a higher degree or do research which would be of professional benefit.
 In Ireland, the emphasis in initial teacher education (ITE) was on the teacher as a teacher
rather than as a subject specialist, which led to some language teaching being undertaken
by teachers without a formal language qualification or expertise, and with a consequent
role for in-service of compensating for ITE.

5.  More recently, in many parts of the “developed world” LTE has become
more problematic than at any time in its past, as a new political and managerial
ideology of education overtakes it. for example , in “developed” countries such
as the UK, USA, and Australia educational policy-making has become
increasingly political.
 As a result of globalization, LTE is immediately “engaged” in diverse ways.
These may include the promotion of international English, the promotion of
other major languages in order to restrain or at least compliment them the
seemingly irresistible rise of international English, the maintenance and
revitalization of lesser-used heritage or community languages, and the
development of a strategy for “languages education”

6. Aspects of Provison
A framework for LTE provision:
Aspects of
provision
Particular instances
Stage of LTE •Pre-service • On-the-job •In-service
For which
sector
• Pre-school •Elementary school •Secondary
school • Further or higher education •
Informal education
Types of
provision
• 1-day seminars • Conferences • Short
courses • Higher degrees •
Undergraduate programs
Modes of
provision
• Direct contact • Mixed-mode • Mixed
mode • Web-based
• Higher Education • Teachers • Accredited

7. Aspects of Provison
A framework for LTE provision:
Aspects of
provision
Particular instances
Receivers • Teachers • Teacher educators • School
management • Students preparing to become
teachers
Stakeholders • Teacher education providers • Students preparing to
become teachers • Parents • Staff in schools •
Students learning languages
Functions • Training • Education • Personal
development
Key provision
factors
• International and national agencies • Teacher supply
• Continuous professional contact • Adequate
conditions of work

8. A framework for LTE provision:
 The “ownership” of LTE may be plotted across three phases.
In phase 1, it was “owned” by LTE professionals who in keeping
with professionals generally were trusted to put their particular
expertise at the service of society, e.g., It is possible that some LTE
courses for TESOL still fall into this category, taking students from
many different countries, giving them what the staff considers will be
a good LTE experience.
phase 2, LTE professionals are considered as “providers” in a
provider-client relationship and are held accountable for the extent to
which they satisfy “customers” such as Ministries, local authorities,
and schools.
phase 3, LTE is viewed as not being owned exclusively by any one
group but as jointly owned by a range of stakeholders. As a

9. What is provided?
LTE providers can support language teachers, student teachers, and others
in respect of:
 The implications of particular language policies and guidelines.
 Proficiency in the languages they teach.
 Pedagogy, assessment, and evaluation.
 First and additional language development and the relation of this to multiple
literacies and to cognitive, emotional, and personal development.
 Language structure (including discourse), function, and use.
 Intercultural development.
 Autonomy, including learner and teacher development.
 ICT (information and communications technology).
 Affective characteristics of learners, e.g., Attitudes, motivation, anxiety.
 Cognitive characteristics of learners, e.g., Aptitude, learning strategy, verbal and
other ability.
 Languages in society.
 Teachers as researchers and as users of research.

10. ProvisionFactors International and national
agencies
Teacher supply
Continuous professional
contact
Adequate conditions of
work
Supportive ethos
Some of the “provision factors” that exercise a positive or a
negative influence on LTE.

11. The “provision factors” that exercise a positive or a negative
influence on LTE.
 International and national agencies:
The European Commission has invested
very large sums of money in programs that
have helped internationalize LTE by
bringing together networks of language
teacher educators from different member
states in order to develop strategies and
materials suitable for the pre-service
education of language teachers in primary
(elementary) schools. Of similar value have
been the international workshops for LTE
staff put on by the Council of Europe,
dealing with major policy priorities such as
the reintroduction of modern languages at

12. The “provision factors” that exercise a positive or a negative
influence on LTE.
 International and national agencies:
Other agents that serve to promote
transnational developments in LTE across
the world are “cultural institutes” such as
the British Council, the French Institute,
and other cultural bodies associated with
particular consulates. Each of these are
organizations of one particular country, but
they have many bases across the world
with a mission to promote their particular
languages and the cultures associated with
them.

13. The “provision factors” that exercise a positive or a negative
influence on LTE.
 Teacher supply:
A key aspect of provision must be the
supply of an adequate number of
adequately educated and trained
teachers. However, this is often a major
problem. Central to this provision must
be a combination of good teaching and
of adequate proficiency in the languages
concerned, but often this combination is
not available.

14. The “provision factors” that exercise a positive or a negative
influence on LTE.
 Continuous professional contact:
 Fullan (1991, p. 53) claims that “teachers do
receive information literature and must attend
workshops here and there, but they do not have
the opportunity for continuous professional
contact, which would become necessary for
becoming aware of and following up of innovative
ideas.”
 Brown & McIntyre (1993, p. 13) claim a major flaw
with in-service courses has been that “almost
always, in-service has been based on a ‘deficit
model’ of teaching. . . The emphasis has been on
the identification of what it is thought teachers
ought to be doing and are not doing, and an
appropriate action to remedy matters.” They claim
this deficit model makes it difficult for teachers to
recognize their own skillfulness and discourages

15. The “provision factors” that exercise a positive or a
negative influence on LTE.
 Adequate conditions of work:
Crookes (1997a, 1997b) believes that the general working
conditions of many second and foreign language teachers
are unsatisfactory, with the consequence that the
relationship between teaching and research is almost non-
existent, and “there are grounds for grave concern when
we consider the factors influencing second and foreign
language teachers and teaching in many parts of the
world”. These include long classroom hours, lack of
preparation time, lack of funds for materials and
equipment, and limited time for reading, writing, or
reflection. He concludes that “the work conditions of
second and foreign language teachers, the conception of
a teacher’s responsibilities, and the conception of
schools’ responsibilities in sustaining professional

16. The “provision factors” that exercise a positive or a
negative influence on LTE.
Supportive ethos:
The factor that strongly influences LTE
is the provision of a supportive ethos
within the academic institution where
LTE is located. Where a supportive
ethos does not exist and priorities lie
elsewhere, then the quality of LTE can
be compromised. Many LTE staff.

17. Ideology and Process
 Freeman’s (2002) excellent review of teacher knowledge and teacher learning traces
the emergence of a view of teaching as “mental activity” proceeding through three
phases.
 In the first phase, pre-1980, the notion of “mental activity” was absent, as the content and
the methodology of a teacher’s task existed in two totally separate and “given” domains
 Then in the years 1980–90 there came a phase in which what was happening inside a
teacher’s head became worthy of research and development interest, as teachers came to be
seen as decision makers.
 Finally, in the last ten years of the decade, as language teachers were understood as seeking
to bring content and methodology together and to reconcile different images which were
operating simultaneously, including not only an image of the self as a teacher at present, and
of the learners who were being taught but also as embodied in a number of former and
potential selves, for example as a trainee teacher, as a learner, as a future expert.

18. IdeologyandProcess
Competency-based LTE
Reflection-based LTE
Teachers’ knowledge
and beliefs
Ideology and Process

19. Ideology and Process
 Competency-based LTE:
On this approach, competencies are specified which relate
to practice. They are not derived exclusively or even mainly
from research, but tend more often to reflect pragmatic
discussion among stakeholders, with inputs not only from
teacher educators but also teaching and management staff
in schools or other institutions, accrediting bodies, parents’
representatives, researchers, and ministry or local officials.
The competences constitute a checklist of specific
functional objectives toward which the trainee aspires.
Although in some countries they undoubtedly reflect
political and bureaucratic demands for control and

20. Ideology and Process
 Reflection-based LTE
A reflective approach is a reaction against the forces of
bureaucracy, centralization, and control which have been
descending on teacher education. Teachers in fact should
not be seen simply as “deliverers” of a fixed “curriculum,”
but should be valued as reflective professionals who frame
and re-frame problems and test out their interpretations and
solutions. Underlying this view is an assumption that
teachers’ knowledge is not arrived at purely by scientific
means, but that “professionals display skills for which they
cannot state the rules and procedures”.

21. Ideology and Process
 Reflection-based LTE
Van Lier (1996) has also raised a possible problem with “the
content of the reflecting,” arguing it is often impossible to
separate what goes on in class from what goes on
elsewhere in the worlds of the students and their teachers. It
may be difficult or impossible to access relevant information
of this sort so as to be able to reflect on it, and some
teachers may feel reluctant to engage fully with the policy or
administrative issues that directly or indirectly affect what
happens in class

22. Ideology and Process
 Teachers’ knowledge and beliefs
LTE clearly has an important role in encouraging teachers
to explore and refine their own belief systems.
Richards and Lockhart (1994) argue that teachers’ belief
systems are derived from a number of sources: their own
experience as language learners; experience of what works best;
established practice; personality factors; educationally-based or
research-based principles (e.g., cooperative learning); principles
derived from an approach or method (e.g., communicative
language teaching). In order to make coherent sense of beliefs
emanating from sources as diverse as these, teachers need time
away from the pressures of “real-time” teaching in order to allow
the particles of belief from these sources to form a belief system
in which they can then monitor and further adapt.

23. Ideology and Process
 Teachers’ knowledge and beliefs:
 Freeman (1991) suggests that articulation is a process through which teachers clarify
tensions in their professional practice and he outlines three sorts of implications:
 First, there is the importance of articulation in connecting personal knowledge to empirical
knowledge.
 Second, articulation can help in fostering reflection which contextualizes teachers’
knowledge.
 Third, articulation can support the role of emotions and moral beliefs in the sense-making
process.
- Freeman (2002) argues that is the core activity of teacher education and which cannot
thrive in a culture of prescription and transmission. For Freeman, teachers’ mental lives
represent the hidden side of teacher education, and the challenge is to create a sociocultural
environment in which these mental lives can be richly fulfilled.

24. From Novice to Expert
 LTE has a central role in helping teachers learn how
to record, reflect on, and profit from their own
thoughts in relation to their practice, and to use this
for their own professional development from novice
to expert.
 Antonek, McCormick, and Donato (1997) argue that
student-teacher portfolios can do more than inform
teacher educators about what student teachers have
been doing and thinking; they can also help student
teachers form a professional identity.
 The characteristics of working portfolios are that they are
developed over time and allow the author to take risks.
They are also socially constructed because they derive
from the students interacting with learners, fellow

25. From Novice to Expert
 In her account of 26 diary studies of novice English as a second language (ESL)
teachers in the USA, Numrich (1996) found that their early preoccupations were
with their own teaching needs, for example creating a suitable classroom
atmosphere by making the classroom a comfortable, safe environment,
establishing control when students talk, being creative and varied in their
teaching. The diaries revealed aspects which replicated their own second
language learning, such as integrating culture into the language teaching process
and giving students a need to communicate; but they also identified areas where
the novice teacher consciously departed from her own second language learning,
for example, they were less prone to correcting errors or to teaching grammar
than their own teachers had been with them.
 The studies reveal important insight into what makes an expert or experienced
teachers tick. It is not the case, however, that the process of moving from
inexperienced teacher to expert is entirely one of extending and refining one’s
repertoire. Some, though not all, inexperienced teachers display a wider and
more imaginative repertoire of teaching than do their more experienced seniors.
In some senses, the experienced teachers “get by” and achieve good results not

26. LTE and Applied Linguistics
Research:
 There are five roles within LTE to which applied
linguistics research might make a key contribution:
1- A “But it’s not quite like that” role. In many countries across
Europe and elsewhere there is a massive policy commitment to the early
introduction of an additional language.
2 - A “Maybe this is worth considering” role. Here, LTE staff might
draw on applied linguistics research in order to discuss with language
teachers the possibility of trying out new ideas deriving from applied
linguistics research.
3 - A “How might we evaluate/analyze/measure/better
understand our practice?” role. A major example of large-scale
teacher participation in action research, with clear benefits to LTE, is
given by Burton (1997).

27. LTE and Applied Linguistics
Research:
4- A “Can we analyze what we really think about/mean by
this?” role. This is an area in which LTE staff have a vital role
to play in helping teachers and other stakeholders explore,
interrogate, and refine their own knowledge, learning, and
beliefs. In this, they may act as a link between the different
discourses of applied linguistics and of common-sense
language pedagogy.
5 - A “But haven’t we been here before, so what are we going
to do about it this time?” role. During the 1960s and 1970s,
there were several attempts at introducing modern foreign
languages in primary (elementary) school education